The proprietor, editor and publisher of the Bear County Bulletin. He worked for a metropolitan newspaper for a couple of years and came home when his dad's health took a turn for the worse and his mother needed help. He thinks of himself as a good journalist, but he worries about the bottom line, too, because he recalls a time when the newspaper almost went under. His wife, Dawn, is a hometown girl who is content to raise the two teen-age children and attend social events. Mike has a gruff exterior that hides a sentimental side. He is also somewhat obsessive-compulsive. 

The intern. She is a rising senior at the university, majoring in journalism, and her professors think she'll be a star. Her given name is Julia Cathleen, which she doesn't like because it makes her sound like a Southern Belle. She interned at the Atlanta Constitution the previous summer, where she helped expose a thief in a suburban city's water department. One of her professors said she would get a greater variety of experience at a small paper, so she is at the Bear County Bulletin. 

The paper's only fulltime reporter. He graduated from high school and 

junior college and is in his early 

20s. He hopes to get to a larger 

paper sometime, perhaps soon. He 

worries about his lack of a four­

year degree, and he knows he needs a few big stories to buttress his 

credentials. 

The secretary and everything else. She is in middle age and began working for Mike's father right out of high school. She is unmarried. 

The city clerk, one .of the city's few full-time employees. She is in her 40s, attractive and exudes a certain sex appeal. She is a native and has been working for the city 

since she graduated from junior 

college, rising from a part-time job to the clerk's job. She has worked 

for the city longer than the mayor 

or council members have been in 

office, and they generally rubber­

stamp whatever she recommends. Men 

like her; women maybe not so much. 

Young black man. He was studying 

accounting in college when his 

father took ill and he came home to help his mother run the farm. He 

works afternoons and evenings doing janitorial work in several buildings downtown and part-time at the 

hardware store.